Piedmont’s City Council voted unanimously on Monday night to permanently shut down the off-leash Linda Dog Park across the street from Beach Elementary School after a resident filed a complaint with the regional Water Board earlier this spring, sparking an inquiry into how the city was managing erosion and run-off on that site.
The abrupt notice of the park’s closure sparked concern from Piedmont and Oakland dog owners who use the park; over 300 people signed an online petition calling for a plan to keep the park open or provide a suitable substitute for it. Seven pet owners spoke to councilmembers Monday night, asking the city to take more time to consider the need for immediate closure. Several spoke to the important community-building role of the park.
At a first reading two weeks ago, councilmembers and city staff said it wasn’t feasible to keep the park open under any circumstances now due to the degradation of the slope and risk of fines. Mayor Betsy Andersen said the Council’s decision Monday night did not preclude a future Council from re-visiting the location’s use.
Vice Mayor Conna McCarthy noted that the Park Commission had, as many as nine times in recent years, dealt with ongoing park issues, including closures due to rain and erosion, and said that the consensus among Commissioners was that the site was never an appropriate site for an off-leash dog park due to its hillside topography.
The city’s Public Works Director Daniel Gonzales affirmed that the city would prioritize finding a different location for an enclosed dog park as it undertakes a sustainability evaluation of all city parks and open spaces. This study will start in July, he said, and a city statement said “it will examine current management practices and existing park uses, including off-leash dog areas, with the aim of developing recommendations for how to best meet the community needs while maintaining healthy and vibrant public spaces throughout Piedmont.”
The city said public works staff will immediately move forward with hydroseeding the hillside, a common erosion control measure that forms a sort of protective shell over the soil, preventing soil erosion and allowing vegetation to begin to regrow.
Councilmembers said they intended to keep the need for a suitable enclosed dog park top of mind and encouraged residents to participate in public meetings that will be part of the sustainability study as it unfolds.
Why not put the dog off-leash area back where it was decades ago: on the flat section at the north end of the property? We got our first Labrador in the early 1990s when we lived off Piedmont Ave. I would jog the dog over to the park every evening after work to toss the ball with him and some of his canine buddies. It was nice! But I heard back then that some neighbors whose yards backed against the park didn’t like us there. I guess that’s why the City moved into the current sloped area. Classic NIMBY.
Abrupt notice” is putting it mildly – in his April 2 briefing to the Park Commission on the Linda dog run, Director Gonzales made no mention of park closer yet 48 hours later the City issued a staff report calling for its closure. And there was no “consensus” about the park among Park Commissioners. To the contrary, in its 2024 report to Council, the Commission stated:
“The Commission has received reports from Staff in each of the last two winters about closures of the Linda park off-leash area. We are interested in reviewing options that improve availability of park space for the designated uses and best manage park resources.”
If anything, Park Commissioners wanted to work on fixing the dog park. Over those 9 meetings, staff never once proposed options for fixing the park. The Water Board never cited the City of Piedmont for issues at the park and in fact supported solutions that preserved the dog park. The City was facing no fines. Closure of this park falls squarely on city staff, not the Park Commission or Water Board.
Is this comment section functioning?